


A Series of Confusing Events

by Galaxy_Cerebri



Series: Dead Bodies, Crime and Other Reasons Why We Can't Have Nice Things [1]
Category: League of Legends
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternative Universe - Buddy cop, Alune is the noisy peanut gallery, Budding Love, Comedy, Crack Treated Seriously, Crime Family, Found Family, M/M, Murder Mystery, No beta we die like illiterates, Queerplatonic Relationships, Riot wouldn't tell us about the pretty lady in Sett's art, Riot wouldn't tell us about where Sett is from, So I made it up, and she's ok with this, buddy cop, but not?, crime found family, in the vein that all buddy cop movies are crazy and unrealistic, so she's an oc, sorta - Freeform, technically
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-06
Updated: 2020-04-12
Packaged: 2021-03-02 03:54:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,742
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23518765
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Galaxy_Cerebri/pseuds/Galaxy_Cerebri
Summary: " If he was going to get arrested, it might as well be for some shit he actually did, right?Sanaat is a barely functioning coastal city in the northwest of Navorri, where the local hierarchy is (in order from least to most powerful):- The Governer- The various gangs in order and- SettWhat better way to knock it all down than get rid of the strongest guy and wait for the power vacuum to swallow everything up in it's wake as everyone clambers for his spot. So someone does that. It doesn't particularly end well for them, however.Or to put it simply:In which Sett is framed for murder, Sanaat is about to topple in on itself but there's a pretty Lunari willing to help him figure out who's behind it, so everything isfine!
Relationships: Aphelios/Sett (League of Legends)
Series: Dead Bodies, Crime and Other Reasons Why We Can't Have Nice Things [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1692358
Comments: 11
Kudos: 27





	1. Enter Body, Stage Left

There was a dead body. On the floor.

Not the first one Sett had been exposed to and, since the other man isn't retching in a dark corner, he didn't think his company was new to them either. Their face was caved in, unidentifiable due to the violence dealt unto it, yet the clothes were meticulous and the fabric seemed expensive even in Sett’s hungover daze. Obviously ironed, artfully pressed and tailored to the victims body.

What was new in all of this, however, was that they weren't in the Pit. 

It was in the middle of a shitty suburb, where every house looks almost identical and all the lawns were meticulously hand picked of weeds. The room he was in was meticulously designed, settee perfectly against the wall. Silk curtains, embroidered with gold weaving patterns that made his head spin, were pushed out of the way to reveal open windows that let bird songs dance in with the wind. You wouldn’t even think someone had died here with how out of place it looked. 

He didn’t even remember how he got in there. Just woke up there to find some random alive guy, and a random dead guy. He remembered a night of drinking, and a couple fights in the pit to hype up the crowd but… not much else. He’d had way too much to drink… shit. His head pounded as he shifted from the floor into a standing position. He screwed his eyes shut as the light burned his eyes.

Then his ear twitched towards the door, picking up the sound of boots and unsheathing blades and barked orders that caught his attention. With a sigh, he muttered "Ahhh shit..." before quietly raising his hands, just as the door broke open. 

"I swear, we got it like this."

The city guardsman scoffed at the Boss of the Pits. In that moment, Sett had a feeling that a delicate balance might be about to be toppled over like playing card towers in the wind. He bit back a curse as the guards yanked one of his arms backward to shackle him. “Watch it!” he barked. His companion was silent as he too was roughly shackled. 

It didn’t take long before they were unceremoniously shoved into a dingy cell together, a single, tiny, barred window let the noon sun in and the sound of crashing waves in the distance. “This can’t be _happening_ ,” he hissed through his teeth. It was only a matter of time before someone bailed him out but this was more than a little humiliating. - And what would his mother say, if she heard about this?

Sanaat was a hellscape on the north western coast of Navori, even if it was a pretty one. The gangs ran the city even if the Governor liked to puff up his feathers like he owned the place. And the gangs, at the end of the day, listened to the pit boss. Because the Pit Boss, ie _Sett_ , let them have a place to beat the shit out of each other without having the city guard on their case. All out gang warfare in the streets wasn’t good for _anyone’s_ business, but this _fucking_ disaster was screwing up _years_ of work.

So close to the old war front, it wasn’t a surprise when Noxian soldiers - fresh off the battlefield and stuck in Ionia, like hounds following the scent of blood - built their pits. Petty and broke, Sett staged a, literally, hostile takeover. He’d _made_ something of the pits, codified it into a functioning system and organisation that made money for everyone. He was an asshole but his momma raised him _right_.

Given the circumstances, they likely wouldn’t even question him, he realised a few hours in after he had been processed and thrown in the cell. Just pass it all off as gang related and move on with their days. Question then, was: Who had orchestrated this? Because Sett didn’t just aim for the face, Sett broke the entire body. It was more efficient that way.

His fist put a crack in the wall as he cursed. The most insulting bit was that he hadn’t even killed the guy. If he was going to get arrested, it might as well be for some shit he actually did, right?

A light tapping caught his attention from the side. Tilting his head, he saw his so-called ‘accomplice’ sitting calmly on a bench against the left wall. With his hangover fading and the light no longer eye searing, he finally got a good look at the man. 

Black hair curved over his right eye, while his left was painted over with a purple crescent. The same tone of purple ran down his face from bottom lip to chin, and he seemed to swim in his clothes. From layer upon layer of dark tones and heavy material, to the gold necklace with a full moon centrepiece and the prayer beads on his left hand, it was obvious that he was Lunari. Question was, why was he so far from Targon? Did things get so bad with the Solari that he had to flee?

No. Sett would have heard about that long before then if that was so.

The man was so quiet, he seemed to disappear if you looked away for long enough. Sett watched intently as deft fingers flickered through hand signs with ease. “ _Please don’t bring the building down on us,_ ” he said “ _It would be unfortunate if you were buried here alive._ ”

“You trying to say you wouldn’t get stuck and I would?” Sett scoffed with a smile, allowing the insolence because what other entertainment did he have in the dank cell.

“ _Precisely_.”

The more he thought on it, the lithe man could probably fit through the bars in the cell door if he dislocated a shoulder or two and ditched all the layers. The Governor should probably look into that. With an annoyed sigh, he turned around and sat himself across the stranger on a rickety bench that whined under his weight. 

“So, explain to me. Why the hell were you in that room? Unless, of course, I convinced you to go along with me in my blackout haze. Great place to have a one night stand, am I right? So cosy and alone. Just you, me and the dead guy.”

“ _Please don't act like I don't have standards,_ ” the mute man replied, his mouth twitching in what was almost a grin. “ _It's in poor taste to flatter oneself so much_.” 

Sett laughed at the response, more amused than insulted by the idea. “Then what brings you to Sanaat? I think I’d remember a face like yours with a tongue like that.”

“ _Ironically,_ ” He said, rolling his eyes, “ _You_.”

“Oh?” Sett hummed with a smirk.

“ _You_ are _the Pit Boss, correct?_ ”

“That’s me. Tell me more,” Sett instructed, leaning forward in his seat. “What can little ol’ me do for you?” he asked, sinking into his chair. It probably wouldn’t be good for his back but you win some you lose some.

“ _I_ _was hoping to barter for some information somehow, you are said to have knowledge on everything. Or at least where to find it_ ,” he explained, “ _But given the circumstances… I believe we can do each other a favour?_ ”

“Do tell,” Sett grinned viciously, he liked where this was going. It was always nice having a fair deal for once.

“ _I help you find the person who did this,_ _I get my information for free. Or as free as such a deal will allow._ ”

“A smart man knows that nothing in this world is free,” Sett commended, “Alright. I’ll take this deal.”

“ _Very well_ ,” the man returned with fluid ease and a soft face. Not stoic and empty, but there wasn’t a lot of emotion present as he replied. Prim and proper, so effortlessly put together.

“Got a name?” Sett inquired, leaning forward to place his elbows at his knees.

“ _A-P-H-E-L-I-O-S,_ ” he spelled out, before making a gesture of his two pointer fingers curling around each other like interlocking chain links with the right finger at the top.

“Well, it’s nice to meetcha, Aphelios. You can call me Sett,” he introduced, “I think we’ll get along great. As long as you don’t betray me.”

“ _I’d never even think of it,_ ” Aphelios replied, bowing his head lightly in agreement. A cool sense of calm seemed to follow him as he stretched forward to shake hands with Sett, his hand dwarfing the smaller man’s.

A moment later the door swung open, a black haired woman sauntered in a pretty dress that hugged all the right curves, and an elaborate golden tattoo on her face. Despite everything, it was more than likely that she had at least seven knives on her person, _somewhere._ She already had 5 in plain sight, and strapped to a toned thigh. He’d learnt that the hard way, stabbed at 15 by accident when he’d snuck up on her. Nothing says friendship like shared scars and stories.

“That was fast, Zarya,” he greeted, standing up and stretching out his back.

“You pay me to be fast,” she said, throwing her hair over her shoulder and leaning against the door frame, “Heard you got arrested when I woke up. Got you bailed out and everything, had to use a stash cus they’re watching the pit. Governor wants to make a show of this, you have no idea how expensive it was to get you out.”

“Bail him out too,” he instructed, pointing at Aphelios.

“Seriously?” she asked, in disbelief. “What part of ‘I had to use a stash’ and ‘you were expensive’ don’t you get?”

“You say that like your shoes aren’t. Just do as I say,” he ordered with a laugh, “He’s doing me a little favour for the time being.”

“And that favour being?” she questioned.

With a hungry grin that went from ear to ear, running a tongue over his sharp teeth, salivating at the idea as he answered: “We’re going on a wild hunt, Zar. Now go bail him out.”

“Yes sir,” she retorted, and somehow it sounded like an insult coming from her. With a grumble, she spun on her heels as she threw her hands in the air in a huff; walking off to pay Aphelios’ bail as well, likely cheaper than Sett’s given the lack of information on him in the city. He chuckled at the middle finger she threw his way along the way. One way or another, Sett was going to have the head of whoever did this like a paperweight on his desk. He’ll string them up and throw them to the rabid dogs, hungering for flesh with a burning fury. 

At least this way he got to have a little bit of fun with the pretty boy along the way.

-

In the highest office in a tall spire that kissed the sky, a man covered in exposed scars sunk into a plush chair artfully placed in front of a desk with a glass of wine in his hand. Behind the desk was a man dressed impeccably, pulling on his collar as he broke out in a cold sweat.

“You’re sure this will work?”

“Even if it doesn’t stick, his neutrality will be worthless now. There will be war on the streets soon,” the scarred man answered with a smug smile, like a viper hiding in the grass. Waiting for their trap to spring, watching with excitement as their target got closer one step at a time. “Relaaaax,” he drawled, taking a long sip of his drink. 

“It’s only a matter of time. First domino has fallen, it’s only a matter of time before the last one hits the floor.”


	2. Hurricane Sett: Category Wasted

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> alternatively: The Hangover, except John Wick is the protagonist.

Stepping into the afternoon light, Aphelios let out a sigh; Alune flickered in and out of view in the corner of his eye as he zoned out of reality to focus on her presence. In the background, the voices of Sett and the newly named Zarya buzzed like white noise. His eyes slowly fell closed as he tapped against the tenuous string that held him and Alune together to find some measure of comfort.

There was a chance this could all end horribly. He hadn’t just wagered with his life in that deal. He was the Sword of the Faithful, the last connection that Lunari had to his sister and the temple. If he died… It was a thought he didn’t even want to entertain. A light tapping on the connection pulled him back, like chimes dancing together in the wind.

“So what’s the plan?” he heard the woman ask as he returned to the realm of the living, arms crossed over her chest daintily by the time his eyes had focused on the pair of criminals with him. And wasn’t that a trip? 

“ _We retrace Sett’s steps from last night_. _It’s the only lead we have at the moment anyway_.” he put forth.

He watched as Zarya looked at the pit boss blankly. At his nod, she returned her gaze back to him and nodded in agreement. He knew it was unlikely that Zarya would agree straight away when he made the suggestion but he knew that, as long as he stayed on Sett’s good side and he worked the case, the Pit Boss would be unlikely to go berserk like a rabid dog.

He hoped.

“First place has to be the last place you were at before the crime scene, which was?” she questioned, staring at Sett with cold eyes.

“Why you asking me like I know?” Sett retorted to Aphelios’ confusion. How could he _not_ know? “Last place I remember being was the Dead Man’s Rest. It’s all kind of a blur after that…”

Zarya sighed, not shocked in the slightest. “You never did have any brains.”

“That’s what I have you for.”

“Damn straight,” she nodded, “Dead Man’s Rest it is.”

It was a long walk to their destination but when they arrived Aphelios quickly realised what the Vastayan meant about not knowing a thing. The Dead Man’s Rest was a bar.

Or rather it _had_ been a bar. But when they got there it took them a few moments to scrape their jaws off the ground. The building was a wreck, a broken-in door with smashed glass sprinkled all over the floor like shattered stars. The inside was, somehow, worse. Like a hurricane had blown through, there were smashed bottles, upended tables and splintered chairs. The bar top was dented and cracked in places, and shelves hung from the wall limply. A handful of people were quietly sweeping up the mess here and there.

“Oh look," an exhausted bartender drawled, filing her nails from behind the battered counter top "It's Dumb and Dumber." There was a dead look in her eye with a broom or mop leaning against the counter next to her, as if she had accepted that Sett might kill her and yet, it was worth it to tear him a new one. Aphelios could respect that. He kind of wanted to join her and he only knew the man for a few hours.

"Wait wait wait," Sett interjected, a finger wagging between them, not even including Zarya in the equation. Which, in retrospect made sense to Aphelios. In the little while he’d known her, even Aphelios could already tell she was the embodiment of common sense to Sett’s lax attitude. 

(If he had to compare Sett to anything… he would be a lazy dog that could rip your throat out with it’s teeth if it was bothered enough.)

"Who's who?" Sett asked, as if that was the important thing here.

With a deadpan stare, the woman points a finger at Sett and says "Dumb, cus you're you." Then her focus shifted and she pointed to Aphelios, stating: "And you're Dumber for willingly associating with him."

A brief moment passes in the clattering noise as the pair of men look at each other before looking back at her. Shrugging, they made vague sounds of agreement as Sett affirmed: "Yeah, sounds about right," 

While Phel signed: " _That's fair_."

“Zarya,” the bartender greeted. The woman nodded in turn while the bartender set down her nail file. “What do you want?” she glared.

“So what happened here?”

“You!” she spat, leaning forward to rest her chin on her hand, a disgusted sneer on her face.

“Ohhhh it was one of _those_ nights…” he heard Sett mumble off to the side.

With a confused look Aphelios asked: “What exactly did he have to drink?"

A barked laugh exploded out of the bartender before Sett even answered. “What _didn’t_ he drink is a better question!”

Then she started listing out a series of drinks, each one with a name more obscene with the last. Sett snorted when she got to ‘The Warfront’. “That’s my favourite,” the fighter informed him, leaning into Aphelios’ space to whisper into his ear.

“ _What’s in it_?”

“Well you take an Old Wilds and then you take a Noxian Bomb. Then you throw the bomb in, y'know like in the war, and take it all as a chug-”

“Focus!” Zarya snapped before returning to the unnamed woman. “Did Sett do anything stupid last night?”

“Please be specific,” the bartender instructed. She sighed, rolling her eyes before telling them about how he wrecked the bar, started a brawl and then disappeared into the night. “You kept buying drinks and smashing the empty glasses against the floor,” she told him as he winced.

“Then you found out it sounded nicer when it hit the table. So I gave you a drink in a stronger glass, it didn’t break so you broke the table in your unyielding attempts to make the ‘ _smashy sound_ ’,” she continued, her voice getting louder and higher in pitch as she got angrier and angrier. Her fingers making quotation marks as she spoke.

“ _Then_ when we tried to kick you out, you started a fucking fist fight!” she roared at him. “Now, is there any way to get you out faster? The bar may just be the foundations left at this point, but they're _my_ foundations!”

“Do you know what I did _after_ the brawl?” Sett inquired.

“You punched me first and knocked me out in the barfight, _dumbass_ ,” she hissed. She ignored Zarya as she stepped forward with raised hands to temper her rage, continuing on with “How the _fuck_ would I know?!”

“I have a buddy,” a croaking voice piped in from the back. Looking around, they saw an old man leaning against a back wall, seated on the only working chair left as he played with a pack of cards. “Said he saw you in the warehouse district last night. Around dawn.”

“What the fuck was I doing there?”

The old man merely shrugged before going back to his cards. A light nudge of a feeling, like hearing a voice from across your home, tickled Aphelios’ sides. Alune was amused. _Very_ amused, likely laughing to herself quietly so that the sound wouldn’t distract him. What part of this was amusing? This was a shipwreck waiting to happen.

“Guess we know where we’re going next,” Zarya said as they all made their way to leave. Suddenly, Sett came to a halt, looked over his shoulder, and asked, “Can I get a drink before we go, at least?”

“Get the fuck out,” the bartender snapped, grabbing her nail file as if it were a dagger. Pointing it at him like it would get far, through the heavy muscle that made up Sett.

“Right,” he said, before rushing them all out of the bar at which point Alune’s laughter became real. He could hear it like bells in his ear as the faded image of her came into existence, overlayed by a blue hue. The sound of it brought a light smile to his face when they exited into the main street.

“ _It seems you’ve found an interesting one, dear brother_ ,” she whispered into his mind joyfully. The only upside to this madness, he supposed, was her smile.

“What’s our plan for the warehouse district?” Zarya questioned, her heels clicking against the dirt path of the street like she was walking across a stage. _Her_ stage.

“ _We’ll have to have someone scout ahead_ ,” Aphelios stated, “ _With that much ground to cover with such large buildings to hide in, there could be enemies hiding in any and every shadow,_ ”

“Want me to go?” Zarya asked Sett, pausing in her step to wait for his answer. She pulled out one of the knives strapped to her thigh. Making it dance in her hand, she flipped it through the air with a smirk on her face.

“ _I’m a marksman,_ ” Aphelios countered, nudging at Alune for her to place a weapon in his hand. “ _I might notice more?_ ” And slowly a weight fell into his hand. Severum bled into existence silently, the scythe-like pistol having an eerie glow in the twilight as night crashed into day.

“I’ll leave it to you, then,” Sett said simply, gesturing for Aphelios to go. Before Zarya could say a word, he could see Sett grab her arm and pull her back again, and after that he was out of range.

Sett waited for Aphelios to get out of sight, throwing an arm over Zarya’s shoulder as he leaned down so they could whisper to each other in the semi busy street. “You sure about sending him ahead? Can we even trust this guy? It's always the pretty ones you have to look out for," she warned, gesturing at herself as she said: "Case in point."

"He was in the room, I don't know how much he actually knows. He says he was looking for me for info-" Sett explained, his ears flickering forward and back with the wind.

"But he could have been there as a plant." she cut him off, with a nod. 

Straightening his back, they walked down the path toward the warehouse district lethargically, arm in arm like always. An easy thing for them to do, and so calm. A reminder of simpler times, almost.

"Exactly," he said smugly, glad that - as ever - Zarya could tell what he was planning. "Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer."

"And your blade behind your back." she tacked on with a smirk of her own.

"That's where you always are."

**Author's Note:**

> Just gonna... Pepper in the fact that they're gay. For each other.


End file.
